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THE LUB1TSCH TOUCH
Improved Paramount
Productions.
TT'EEN.picturegoers.and those in the in
-'-.dustry are keenly awaiting the arrival
of the first three Paramount pictures —
'Hands Across the Table,' 'Mary Burns,
Fugitive' and 'So Red the Rose'— wnicn
were made from story selection to com
pleted film under the control of Ernst
Lubitsch, who was appointed director of
productions early last year. For the first
six months he was clearing up the
schedules of his predecessors and these
three films are the first on which the little
German executive's policy can be judged.
Unless they are prereleased Perth will
not see them until the last quarter of this
year but comment from America makes
interesting reading.
The 'Los Angeles Times' wrote:
'The 'touch' is making itself felt at
last.- Months ago, this paper speculated
on the result of Ernst Lubitsch's appoint
ment as Paramount chief, on the effect of
directorial genius on wholesale produc
tion, 70 films annually, instead of one.
The beetle-browed little German, they say,
has got right into the thick of things —
touching up scripts, casting roles, passing
none Help
Frank Lawton and Mauraan O'Sullivan in a
romantic scene from 'David Copperfield,'
the best film yet seen in Perth a Dickens
novel. It will follow 'Naughty Marietta'
at the Royal Theatre.
Frank Lawton and Mauraan O'Sullivan in a
romantic scene from 'David Copperfield,'
the best film yet seen in Perth a Dickens
novel. It will follow 'Naughty Marietta'
at the Royal Theatre.
on music, bouncing from writer to super
visor to director to player. Their tang
ible response is already to be noted in
'Hands Across the Table,' 'Mary Burns,
Fugitive' and 'So Red the Rose.'
'Mr. Lubitsch has been quoted as de
claring that it takes a year to swing a big
studio around. These three quality pic
tures, then, are encouraging visible evi
dence of a big-studio swinger just hitting
his stride. Praised at a preview showing,
Claudette Colbert's 'The Bride Comes
Home,' will arrive next. In 'Desire/ Mr.
Lubitsch believes he has created 'a flesh
and-blobd Dietrich, a human being.' It
was his insistence on Harold Lloyd for
the lead in 'The Milky Way,' that mater
ialised in what Mr. Lloyd himself now
rates his best comedy. It was his well
known partiality to music which inspired
an original operetta in .'Rose of the
Rancho,' for Gladys Swarthout; and now
an original grand opera in the same star's
'Give- Us This Night,' with score by Erich
Wolfgang Komgold.
'.'Mr. Lubitsch instituted the 'remake'
system in the belief that the end justifies
the means, and removed cramping re
strictions from such imaginative able dir
ectors as Lewis Milestone, King Vidor and
Frank Borzage. An artist himself, he
knew. . . . An artist reconciling Turnspit
to mass 'touches' — and chuckling about
it.'
The 'Film Daily' (New York) in an
editorial 'said: 'When these three pic
tures have circulated through the
theatres of a nation the generous public
patronage of the public will be reflected
in increased Paramount earnings. Mr.
Lubitsch has a keen sense of what con
stitutes mass entertainment — the only
type of man who should be allowed at
the head of any studio.'
$